Hacker News Reader

Comment by s1512783 | Hacker News Reader

"Providing open access to the technical specifications of consumer electronics would enable criminals to “more easily circumvent security protections, harming not only the product owner but also everyone who shares their network,” and "On the other end, John Deere argues that access to the company’s proprietary software could be used to bypass emissions controls or safety measures"

Of course they're doing it all for our own safety. It makes me mad when people bring up security through obscurity as a reason for locking down devices. It's such a blatant lie.

View on HN

Yeah, it's absolutely infuriating, especially when you know how most businesses tend to ignore any and all security measures not forced by law, or widespread customer revolt.

One of the worst arguments imo is that argument about emission control circumvention. It's so disingenuous it makes me almost sick. Sure, protecting the environment is critically important - at least in my opinion - but it's certainly not this supposed mass of people circumventing emission controls that are the real criminals when it comes to environmental damage. Businesses seems to proudly, and continually, carry that torch by themselves. As long as not laws or widespread public outcry makes it impossible for them to make business, environmental damage is a absolutely ignored by all but a very few.

> "On the other end, John Deere argues that access to the company’s proprietary software could be used to bypass emissions controls or safety measures"

They do have a point on emission controls, though. Pretty much every person I know that owns a diesel car has either ripped out or plans to rip out the particulate filter. Doesn't matter that it's illegal, doesn't matter that it hurts everyone around. People just don't care.

I'm all for the right to inspect and mod electronics, hardware and software alike, but we also need alternative ways to stop socially irresponsible people.

You mean like emission testing?

What happens in 15 years when that particulate filter wears out and nobody can fix it but the rest of the car is fine?

> You mean like emission testing?

Would be great.

> What happens in 15 years when that particulate filter wears out and nobody can fix it but the rest of the car is fine?

If it weren't so easy to get away with not having that filter, then what would happen is a secondary market that sells replacement filters for old cars, just like it happens for every other car part.

> Would be great.

In my state any vehicle under 25 years old must go in for emission testing every few years or the tabs can't be renewed.

> If it weren't so easy to get away with not having that filter, then what would happen is a secondary market that sells replacement filters for old cars, just like it happens for every other car part.

Assuming owners have a right to repair of course.

Many states have gotten away from tailpipe sniffer inspections (more expensive and less convenient) and gone to visual and car ECU inspections (hook up the scanner, if there are no emission related codes and the car reports “ready”, you’re good).

> visual and car ECU inspections

The rideshare driver I mentioned elsewhere in this thread[0] also told me that he knows people who tune engine firmware for diesels, and that they do disable error codes related to their tuning and the missing filter - and that it's important to be aware of this when getting the car repaired for unrelated issues, because the tuning hacks may mask problems in diagnostics and confuse the repair people.

[0] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20235002

That definitely happens. My prior car was ECU modded by the prior owner to eliminate EGR which was a maintenance hog on the turbo diesels. Many aftermarket ECU flash programs can be undone if diagnostics are required.

And you're spending most of your money fixing all the expensive computers and sensors in your car instead of cleaning dirty fuel injectors and the like.

Maybe, though the total amount I've spent in the last decade across two daily drivers on sensors/computers was $12 for a knock sensor, $9 for a can of MAP sensor cleaner, and $78 for an O2 sensor, so it's far from prohibitive and that computerization of fuel and ignition makes the cars much more efficient, powerful, and easier to start as compared to the carbureted or pure mechanically injected predecessors.

Replacement parts aren't an issue for motor vehicles. In 2013 when I was still driving a 1995 GMC 1500 I could still easily source replacement parts for it, including replacement headlight trim rings, replacement fuel injectors, replacement fuel pumps, replacement throttle bodies, etc. etc.. So that's not an argument that holds any water whatsoever with me.

Worst case in 15 years there will be a few shops around the country who specialize in rebuilding/remanufacturing the part and will sell you a remanufactured part for a set price plus a refundable core fee. This was the case for my throttle body, and for the fuel pressure regulator there were rebuild kits available from Napa.

I'd like to see a class-action lawsuit against the people who rip them out as they're personally making it harder to breathe where I live. Your right to do whatever you want ends at my nose.

This is true of old John Deere equipment too. The point is manufacturers (like John Deere, or Apple) are trying to make this kind of repair impossible.

I'm not advocating for people breaking emission laws. I'm saying you don't prevent that by revoking the right to repair.

> Replacement parts aren't an issue for motor vehicles.

Tell that to my Isuzu VehiCROSS!

Had mine in the shop to wait 6 months to find a -used- intake manifold...sigh.

I wonder if it could be possible to "film" the particulate emissions somehow, so cameras on highways with an extra setup could identify the offenders?

Would love to see that happening. Wonder what tech satellites use to identify atmospheric composition from orbit, and whether it couldn't be used in traffic cams?

I suspect those satellites use Raman spectroscopy, but particulates in our context arent molecules, so I think it would be hard to apply?

Well, particulates are still molecules. There should be a measurable difference.

Do you only know car enthusiasts? Most regular people probably don't even know diesels have an extra particulate filter, yet care enough to actively modify their car to circumvent it; it's hard enough convincing them that their oil needs to be changed more than once a decade. There's no point beyond regular vehicle inspections to go after the 0.01% of the population that are car enthusiasts willing to modify their vehicle and bribe their way past inspections

No, I know regular people - some of which don't know the first thing about car internals, except the concept that if you have a diesel, there are people who will remove some component from it that will lower your total cost of ownership. Two weeks ago, I had a rideshare driver brag to me about how he knows a guy who knows a guy who could do this for him.

I have no first clue how these people get around yearly inspections; I've assumed that particulate filters must not be covered by inspections, though it wouldn't surprise me at all if it turned out people bribe their way through. While the overall levels of corruption in Poland aren't high, the levels of respect for car safety regulations and traffic rules seem pretty low in this country.

Ah Poland, I thought you were talking about the US where a lot of the population is absolutely useless in terms of car mechanics; but yeah on the car forums I frequent tossing the mechanic a Benjamin is the usual tactic to have a tuned car in places that have inspections like California.

I guess it's a symptom of the only people willing to be learn to be a car mechanic and do inspections being part of the same group which generally see emission/safety regulations as being overburdening

a single polluting car emits as much NOx etc as 10s of thousands of compliant cars.

So it doesn't require a lot of people circumventing emissions to cause damage to the environment.

Source?

The information I read[0] says that a non compliant car emits about as much NOx as 4 complaint cars. I would be shocked if your figure was anywhere remotely close to true.

[0] http://www.air-quality.org.uk/26.php

> Most regular people probably don't even know diesels have an extra particulate filter

I doubt that. Vehicles with a DPF have an indicator of when they're going through a regen cycle.

Deere could make the emission control system separate from everything else instead of tightly integrated to help make that harder but that method would not increase service revenue.

"but we also need alternative ways to stop socially irresponsible people"

How about regular car inspections? And if you say they don't work because of bribery, then that is a different problem, which can be solved by inspections of car inspections and fines that do hurt.

But I suppose the real problem is that many people does not really believe, that it is really a problem, so no political support then to stop this behavior.

Irresponsible people like, for example, those who deliberately installed defeat devices?

Manufacturers don't trust users, but ask users to completely trust them. This is what we're asked to do post diesel emissions scandal.

> Irresponsible people like, for example, those who deliberately installed defeat devices?

Yes, them too!

> Manufacturers don't trust users, but ask users to completely trust them.

It's less that manufacturers don't trust users, and more that they could be held legally responsible for users' behavior here.

But you have to be careful about criminals. They’re always criming.

I think there are many reasons for not supporting repair - some better some worse - but this is still the most stupid one.

I’ve never had these problems on my thinkpad running Linux. Why does my phone have to mitigate them?

Sounds like the same argument made against open source.

> It's such a blatant lie.

yes and no. Most today's CE devices lose 3/4 of their utility when disconnected from their shared medium. People running such mediums usually require some sort of certification from the participant devices, and in case the device has been modified, a re-certification after modifications is usually required.

Even replacing a couple of diodes by a looking-close-on-paper analogue might harm performance for neighboring participants in the communication. I let you imagine what one could do with arbitrary firmware images on a fully unlocked device.

I'd be curious to see what solutions to that the infrastructure people work out when these laws are eventually adopted.

If you design a system where remote users are impacted by other remote users' malicious actions, you've just created a bad system. "Criminals" can still do anything they want to the firmware of a JD, it's just illegal. Nothing actually stops them. But if JD designed a system that prevented local modification from affecting others, then they wouldn't have this problem.

Absolutely agree! Also in that world, all engineers would be smart, given all the necessary information, all equipped with all expensive measurement tools, and be given enough time to do good work (and motivated to do that). After coming back home at 5pm, they would grab the same expensive measurement equipment and start hacking on their devices, putting in the same high quality and knowledge and high conscience.

Illegal? Criminal? Mind you, a noob replacing a diode without knowing better, like I said.

> let you imagine what one could do with arbitrary firmware images on a fully unlocked device.

You could .. avoid paying the manufacturer's fees for re-enabling features that the firmware has disabled? You could refill your ink cartridges?

Bad actors at this layer seem to be quite rare. And the whole reason everyone uses the unlicensed bands is the freedom to transmit (and expectation of recieving) arbitrary signals.

> Bad actors at this layer seem to be quite rare.

I think our experience is rather limited for the moment to tell (ok, barring refilled cartridges ;-), since bad acting is inhibited by existing mechanisms. (Even with cartridges -- what if your new yellow ink breaks that hidden watermarking that certain people have come to rely on?)

Compliant device receives an accepted designator (certificate), non-compliant device is not expected to have it. This model can easily be broken, unless it is being taken care of somehow in the new model.

Unlicensed bands are a tiny part of the entire aired RF spectrum -- and we didn't even start speaking of devices sharing a wired RF medium.

Firstly, one wouldn't have to use the "close on paper" if spare parts, or real specs, were actually available.

Secondly, as analog electronics, where the non-compliance argument might matter, are generally built of devices with 5-20% tolerances. Close enough is usually close enough, if you can get the right specs to start with.

Thirdly, the parts of modern communication networks that can actually be affected by component choice is a miniscule part, of the complete systems. Sincr almost no modern communication device is built with more than a few discreet devices around a special RF chip, you really can only repair it with the same chip, and trivially replaceable components.

I can go on. Yes, there are certifications, sometimes they are important and necessary, but usually they are there for business reasons. To create lock-in, or otherwise increase revenue, or to avoid blame by making it look like you care.

I have yet to see an industry certification which has not clearly put in place for a business reason.

For non-industry certifications, there would be no difference in who does the repair, re-certification would be necessary, and society aldready handles this in areas where it's actually needed for safety reasons.

> I can go on.

I'll skip that too. I have a counter argument literally for every your affirmation. Big part of modern CE devices do not fit into your description (or at least, we clearly have in mind very different ones). The more expensive a device, the more complex it generally is, and the higher is the motivation to repair it. I don't think we need the law only to repair car fobs and wireless door keys.

> I have yet to see an industry certification which has not clearly put in place for a business reason.

Since when business reasons became intrinsically bad? Aren't we on HN?

>> I have yet to see an industry certification which has not clearly put in place for a business reason.

> Since when business reasons became intrinsically bad?

The way I read it, it's a shorthand for "has nothing to do with a fair trade of value in exchange for money".

> Aren't we on HN?

HN is not a place frequented by wolves of Wall Street.

> HN is not a place frequented by wolves of Wall Street.

Errr... I hope they manifest themselves right away ;-)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com